The IRS Reminds Me that I Neglected to Pay My Taxes

I got three letters from the
IRS
today — the first I’d heard from them since
May,
2011.

Back then, they were sending me notices of “intent to levy” but they seem to
have had some reluctance to transform their intentions into action, since no
levies were forthcoming.

The latest batch of letters is even tamer. They’re just “Reminder of overdue
taxes” letters for 2007,
2009, and 2010 (in
2008 I didn’t make enough money to owe taxes).
They’re mostly notable for the improvement in their layout. The letters have a
section with a chart that shows how the interest charges have accumulated
during different spans with different interest rates (the interest rates have
vacillated some, with the trend declining from a high of 6% in
2008 to 3%
now).

Tax Year

They think I owed*

Subsequent interest and penalties

Total

Seized

Outstanding

Totals

13,708

1,657

15,365

6,072

9,292

* may include an initial late payment penalty

2005

$784

$255

$1,039

$1,039

$0

2006

4,170

559

4,729

4,729

0

2007

3,695

633

4,328

304

4,023

2008

0

0

0

0

0

2009

1,203

87

1,290

0

1,290

2010

3,856

123

3,979

0

3,979

To this you can add another $4,000 or so for tax year
2011, but they don’t know about that yet. That may explain their lack
of attention, as my $9,292 outstanding balance is below what I understand to
be the threshold at which the
IRS
feels moved to take action these days.

It wouldn’t be the
IRS
if they didn’t screw up something, and I notice that their software failed to
correctly credit me for the partial seizure in
2007 in their page one total (though it does show
up in the course of the itemized interest calculations on page two).

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